According to the latest report entitled ‘Top 4 Trends Shaping Global Consumer Packaging’ by Euromonitor International, the food and beverage industry is the largest user of packaging with combined retail demand exceeding 3.2 billion packs in 2022. The food industry alone has the largest share with 2.4 billion packs. (See Chart 1.0)
The return of socialising in 2021/2022 has brought the recovery of impulse snacking, beverages (single-serve/on-trade) and beauty as in demand for cosmetics and fragrances.
The report also highlighted that plastic packaging amounts to 65% of total global retail packaging, despite its negative impact on the environment. (see Chart 2.0) The sector however is widely active in design innovation with recycled (rPET, rPP), and renewable polymers continue to be in high demand as brands reduce the use of fossil fuel-derived virgin plastics. Paper packaging, on the other hand, is set to make further gains as brands want to reduce their dependency on plastics while adopting a more ‘sustainable’ positioning for their brand.
With rising inflation, brands are also adopting rightsizing for their packages to appeal to consumer pockets. For instance, the use of smaller snack packs and changing the pack type for dairy to pouches to reduce cost of production. For pet owners, there are now economy pet food to tackle rising commodity costs of wheat, chicken and beef in the global market.
Meanwhile, sustainable packaging is the popular word used now to connote brands that sell their products responsibly. Euromonitor did a consumer survey to examine consumer responses to what form of packaging they prefer as sustainable, and 58% mentioned ‘recyclable’ followed by ‘biodegradable’, ‘refillable/reusable’ and ‘compostable’. (see Chart 3.)
